Men of the Night's Watch
by Diglossia
Summary: Pyp's always been good at telling lies. Just his luck, he finally found someone stupid enough not to believe any of them.


The first day Grenn joins the Night's Watch they put him to work in the stables, mucking the stalls and picking hooves. The stable hands tell him to mind the frog and not to spook the horses. Grenn nods and watches them lead the chestnut gelding to pasture so he can clean the stall. It's easy work and the horses are too old and worn out to be high-spirited.

Grenn likes horses but he likes cows more. Horses are mean, quick, and costly. Cows are slow and lazy-eyed, perfectly content to chew their cud while you amble by.

He guesses he's like a cow. Slow and solid, and following the herd wherever it goes. Life's easier if you forget to think.

Grenn's never seen an aurochs and so doesn't bother to hide the bafflement when others call him that. Pyp tells him aurochs are like big cows. That makes Grenn grin. From then on, he takes it as a compliment. It's better than the other nicknames, like Toad and Lord Snow. And Monkey. He asks Pyp if he's seen a monkey before. Pyp says he has but it doesn't matter since everyone knows monkeys don't have ears.

It takes Grenn a whole day to realize Pyp was lying to him.

Grenn's seen the dagger Pyp wears, looked at it in shock the first time. It's the nicest thing he's seen on anyone other than Lord Redwyne when he made an appearance once in the valley. It has a soft leather handle and two small rubies set in the hilt. It doesn't belong to Pyp by right, Grenn knows. He'd have probably been flogged if he had been seen with it before he came to the Night's Watch.

Grenn wants to know the story behind the dagger but when he asks, Pyp shuts his mouth with a smile and pretends he doesn't hear.

ØØØ

Pyp's a liar and the most honest person Grenn knows. Grenn's caught bits and pieces of his former life. He couldn't sort the reality from the fantasy if he were a smart man and no one's ever accused Grenn of being bright.

There are some things he's mostly certain of, like Pyp's age and the mummer's troupe. He doesn't believe Pyp has a sister and he certainly doesn't believe the story about the cheese. Pyp's pilfered more and better from the kitchens and along the journey to the Wall. No mummer would be untalented enough to get caught over a wheel of cheese. He doesn't believe Pyp's murdered a man and worse. He does believe Pyp can tell a person's home by their voice. Why? Because Pyp did it to him.

Grenn doesn't make his past a secret. No one is interested in his story, though, and he isn't the type to move his lips without reason. But for some reason, Pyp likes him and likes talking to him more, so he is the first to pry.

"So are you a Storm or a Sand?" Pyp asked once as they shared a pilfered wineskin. He didn't take much from the kitchens, just enough that the other stewards wouldn't notice.

"Not a bastard," Grenn grunted, raising the wineskin to his lips. Pyp stared at him in disbelief.

"And I'm not a thief," he answered, sarcastic as always. "Stupid Aurochs, you can't change being baseborn. So Storm or Sand?"

"Not a bastard," Grenn repeated. He was telling the truth. Grenn might have been abandoned when he was a child but his father hadn't denied him his last name and what little came with it. The old lady told him it was a boon, the only boon life had given him, the big, festering lump. She loved him, letting him work for her until he came into his majority and had to deal with life's cruelty. He had no lands, no farmholding, no liege lord. He was little more than a bastard but he wa_sn't_a bastard. "M'name was Uller 'fore I got here."

"No, it wasn't."

"Was, too."

"Liar."

They fought, like they always do, words turning into blows. Pyp was better with words and Grenn with blows but Pyp is quick and Grenn is dense, so neither ever gets too terribly hurt. Grenn, if he were the suspicious type, would surely have noticed, would surely _notice_, since the Monkey shows no sign of stopping, that Pyp loves nothing more than goading him, almost as if he has a death wish.

Grenn isn't suspicious, though, and, as it is, he barely notices Pyp's taunts. He supposes that is why the words are sometimes so vicious, Pyp destroying him with words while his eyes roam over Grenn's body.

Grenn doesn't much care. He once had a girl like that, the tailor's niece who said the cruelest things to her suitors but was sweet in the night. Pyp isn't a girl but Grenn isn't choosy.

ØØØ

Grenn forgets what he thought he knew. He's not one for self-reflection and rules are rules. If the sers say a man of the Night's Watch doesn't take a woman, a man of the Night's Watch doesn't take a woman. So he doesn't think about taking his pleasure.

There's always the practice yard or his own hand if he gets desperate but Grenn doesn't, not much. What he does get is angry. He's angry all the time now, frustrated at Pyp for his words, his stupid words, his never-ending _words_.

Pyp is always calling Grenn stupid, like he expects Grenn to swallow it. Grenn may not be smart but he knows how to hold his own and he won't let some big-eared mummer make a fool of him.

They hit the floor, hitting and biting and punching each other. They roll like they always do because Pyp is vicious and quick. Grenn's easily twice his weight but that doesn't seem to matter when they're on the ground and there are nails in his face and knuckles against his throat.

Then he feels it. Grenn's half-hard from the fighting and the closeness of another body (he hasn't had anything these past few weeks) so he tries to hold himself away so he doesn't brush against Pyp. They're moving too quickly, though, and Pyp's knee juts between his legs, his groin pressing against Grenn's thigh. He's hard, Pyp, in the most unmistakable way. Grenn freezes.

Suddenly, a great many things make more sense.

ØØØ

The Wall is a bitterly cold place and not just at the top. The massive block of ice stretches for hundreds of miles from east to west, turning everything a dreary grey-white. There's little to break the monotony of ice and snow, snow and ice.

At first, Grenn sleeps by himself. He wraps himself tight in his blankets and shivers, waking frozen and only colder after a piss. It is miserable and hard, and nothing Grenn did not expect. Dorne is far away from cold. Even in the highest parts of the mountains, it is never like this.

He mentions the cold in the hall one day and is surprised to learn that Rast and Toad share a bed. Toad says sheepishly that it's cold and Rast was willing. He says he wakes warmer. Grenn would like to be warm again.

Pyp hits him over the head when he asks, calling him a bigger fool than ususal, but drags his things into Grenn's room that night without another word.

Toad is right. It is warmer.

ØØØ

"There…was a lord," Pyp tells him one night, his voice hesitant. He rolls the dagger's hilt between his hands, avoiding Grenn's gaze. "He- he wanted something from me that I wasn't willing to give."

"What?" Grenn asks. He was taught to give the lords and ladies what they wanted. The faster they got what they wanted, the quicker they left you alone, the old lady told him. Don't ask questions, just bow your head and give it to them. What had the lord asked for that Pyp wanted for himself?

Pyp shakes his head. "I can't say. But I would not give it to him. He was a fat man, slow and old. When he tried to call for his guards, I took his knife and ran. I was gone before the guards came."

Grenn cocks his head. The story is queer, wrong, and too quickly said but it's a story and the most he will ever get, probably, so he doesn't ask for more.

"I never knew my mother," he offers up, waiting for Pyp to look at him. Grenn's story isn't important to him. He's got nothing to hide, nothing to fear. He's a man of the Night's Watch now and he never did nothing shameful. "Don't remember what my da told me about her. I think she died in childbirth."

"Many women do." Pyp's sadness is almost gone now and his fear, too. He's put his dagger away, setting it under the bed where he can reach it quickly.

Grenn nods.

"When he remarried, my da, he picked an awful woman. She said she didn't want his brat in the house. So he left me outside a farmhouse." Grenn pauses, trying to remember. He'd been three, a babe who barely knew his own name. "Dunno what happened next. Anyway, the lady who found me, Caeryn, took me in. She was a widow with naught but her grandchildren to her name."

"She raised you?" Pyp asks. Grenn nods.

"How'd you end up with a mummer's troupe?" he asks finally.

Then it's gone, Pyp's sadness, as he tells Grenn about the Fingers and Casterly Rock and all manner of far off, exotic places. They never talk about his past again, not that part, the reason he came to the Night's Watch.

ØØØ

Samwell Tarly misses women. He used to think he was going to be married someday. He used to imagine what she would be like, what being married would be like. Now his only wife is the cold and the wind.

He's not the only one who wishes for more than whores.

Maester Aemon can't walk without help. He often sends Sam to fetch things for him. Chett hasn't left his room yet so Sam still sleeps in the room he picked out, down the hall from Toad, Grenn, and their friends. Jon has his own place in a tower somewhere. Sam doesn't know where it is.

He walks quickly, clutching the book the Maester asked for. A white tail brushes against his legs, startling Sam into dropping the book. He gasps, grasping for the precious thin, and stops, hearing voices. If someone found out he damaged Maester Aemon's book…

But the voices aren't from the hallway, they're from a room and they're not so much words as…sounds. Panting, harsh gasps, and groans. Sam's cheeks color.

Sam's always had a strong memory, even if he's too scared to prove it most of the time. He remembers little things, words and gestures other people don't think twice about. Grenn and Pyp share a room, he knows. They fight so much you'd never guess it but they do.

Sam's never even met a whore but he knows the girls from Mole's Town won't venture out to Castle Black. He knows, too, that that isn't a woman's voice. He's relieved…and curious.

A soft, muffled keening sound and the thump of a bed frame. They haven't heard him. Then Grenn's voice murmuring a name that isn't a whore's and Sam's eyes widen.

He grabs the book off the floor and limps down the hallway to Maester Aemon, Ghost following behind him. Sam scratches behind Ghost's ear before shooing the animal away. He hurries, pretending he wasn't listening.

They vowed never to take a woman.

They never vowed not to take a man.

ØØØ

Pyp hates practice and not just because Jon's impossible to win against.

He doesn't like swords. They're big and bulky, and he's small and compact. They don't work together, him and swords. He likes his dagger.

But the Night's Watch isn't interested in training them in weapons uniquely suited to their body types. Sword practice is to teach them defense, a little bit of offense, and to weed out the crappier fighters from those with a glimmer of talent.

Pyp, needless to say, wasn't too surprised when he did not make Ranger. Unfortunately, that didn't get him out of practice. He no longer has to be under Ser Alistair Thorne. That doesn't mean he can sit on his bum all day, "playing with vegetables" as Grenn put it. He did not _play_with vegetables, Pyp retorted hotly, only to find that Grenn had actually gotten him for once, if the big dolt's grin was anything to go by.

Now practice is under Jon and with Grenn and against Toad or anyone in the nearby area Jon ropes in. Jon can be loathsome at times.

Jon tells Pyp he'll never be a great swordsman, or even a good one. Jon can teach him the proper stance for swordfighting and defensive moves that will keep him from being killed. He can't teach Pyp to stay still and fight like a lord. Good, Pyp thinks, he doesn't want to be one. His chosen blade is his dagger, the one he threatened that lord's life with. Swords are for lords. He isn't a lord. He will never be a lord. This dagger got him here. It will stay with him.

ØØØ

His mother once told him he was a born liar. Pyp was a thief and a teller of tales from his childhood on up, a lover of games and fun, and too much trouble to keep around a farm. The mummer's troupe was a dream, a paradise. He could move between lands, never seeing the same people twice, perfecting tricks and lies against unsuspecting people, with only the mummers knowing the truth. They knew he wasn't the long-lost Targaryen prince or the heir to Valyria. They knew he had no gold hidden away in a cave made of black dragon bone or rubies and sapphires buried in the sands of Dorne. They alone knew the truth: that he was the son of farmers in the Riverlands and his parents hadn't died in a mountain clan raid. They might be dead now, Pyp would concede, when one of the mummers would call him out on a lie.

He used to think he could lie his way out of anything. He used to think he could slip between crowds of people, becoming a new person with a few words and a fake accent. He used to think words could overcome any action, any misdeed. He used to think he could be somebody someday, a valiant knight or a maester, or some such thing. Now he knows better.

No lie could have helped him when he threatened to kill a lord. No one believed him when he said what the lord had wanted from him or understood why he objected so strongly, what he was so deathly afraid of. He wondered still when he was on watch or when he was chopping vegetables, or really when he was doing any mindless task, how the lord had known. It had been a split-second decision, fear overtaking him and making him refuse and go past refusal, pulling the knife he'd lifted from the lord's bedroom out and wielding it perfectly, saying he wouldn't, saying he would kill the lord if he came a step closer, saying he'd tell everyone.

A wheel of cheese for a sister who didn't exist. Pyp didn't for a second expect anyone to believe it. That was why he chose it. Part of being a good liar was knowing when to use a bad lie. Everyone would wonder but no one would guess at the truth. No one would come even close to guessing the truth. They would think he'd stolen something worse, money or jewelry, or Valyrian steel. Rumors might start but never, ever anything close to the truth.

It's strange then, that he ended up admitting the truth to Jon. Jon, who hasn't got a thing to be ashamed of compared to the rest of them, who actually chose to come here without the threat of death or a life as bad as death. Pyp can't stand Jon's anger or the pity, not when he spends every day hating himself for what he did, for all the things he had done that led him to that point, for all the things he could have done to have avoided it all. So he breaks, the anger spilling over and poisoning the air, leaving it tainted and awful forever.

Even then he lies. He doesn't tell the whole story, just enough to make his point that Jon's being a bunghole.

Grenn's the person he lies to the most and the least.

Pyp's honest to himself: he doesn't think Grenn's all the things he calls him. He's stupid, for certain, but not that stupid. He's not ugly or smelly, or terrible at whatever thing Pyp says he is that day. He can't stop teasing Grenn, can't stop lying to him. Grenn's too easy. He gets mad quickly, let's Pyp get to him within seconds. It's too much fun for Pyp to stop.

Then there are the times when he doesn't lie and those aren't as rare as they seem. Because when he's lying with his cheek against Grenn's chest and the big oaf's hand on his shoulder, and he's listening to the sound of Grenn's heartbeat, _bu-bump_, _bu-bump_, _bu-bump_, he can't remember how to lie.

ØØØ

The horn sounds from high up on the Wall, signaling the return of the Rangers. Pyp's heart beats too fast, too erratically, as he stares upwards. There's no way to know who is back and who isn't. He forces his gaze back to the spit and the tiny ham haunches. They were larger last month, he's sure.

Still, it's more and better, and more often than he ever got with the mummers.

His hands are shaking too hard to hold the knife steady. Pyp sets it down, deciding the stringy vegetables can wait another minute, and wipes his palms on his thighs.

Three months. Grenn and Dywen have been gone three months and every horn blast makes Pyp more of a mess. It's never Grenn, just more work for Pyp when the returning Rangers come back to the main hall and want feeding. They eat too much and always the best because they're unfailingly friends with one of the stewards- and there are hundreds- and it's just a big muddle of wasted resources when someone gets too excited and burns the night's meal for everyone else.

Pyp jumps at the touch to his shoulder. He turns his head, hopeful and too pessimistic to believe his hope will be well-placed, and sees a slow, achingly familiar smile.

Pyp, being all of a winter on the inside, punches him in the arm.

"You got lost, didn't you? I knew you would, stupid."

"I didn't get lost," Grenn protests. Pyp doesn't wait to hear. He is already pulling him into an embrace. Grenn smells like salt and horses and, somehow, sand. He's cold from the outside air. He feels good against Pyp's flushed skin.

"Come on," Pyp says, grabbing a trencher and a slab of salted beef. He snags a few rolls on the way into the hall. Grenn can get his own damn mead.

They sit at the nearest bench, Grenn eating quickly and Pyp just watching him, just memorizing his face and his hands, and any exposed skin. It's been so hard, he wants to tell Grenn. There's been no one to talk to, no one to laugh with. Everyone is older; everyone is focused on the cooking and the baking. He's the youngest and the newest, and, presumably, the stupidest.

He doesn't say anything because every time he opens his mouth, Grenn's eyes to flick to him and Pyp loses what he was going to say. Grenn's not handsome but he's kind and he cares, and those two qualities mean a lot in the cold wasteland of the Wall.

"There anything to eat?" Dywen asks, clapping Grenn on the back. Grenn shrugs him off with a grunt.

"Salt beef and rolls," Pyp answers, eyes trained on Grenn's face. It's petty of him but he's watching the way Grenn and Dywen act towards each other. They spent a quarter of a year together. They ate together, slept together, rode together for three straight months without once returning to the Wall…or Mole's Town. A bitter taste fills Pyp's mouth.

"You gonna get me some?"

"You can get your own," Pyp says coolly. He doesn't care how petty it is: he's not helping Dywen. Not now, not ever. They stare each other down for several long seconds before Dywen looks away and heads for the kitchen.

"Guess Grenn's the only one gets waited on hand and foot around here," he mutters loud enough for Pyp to hear.

Grenn, finished, stands, tugs at Pyp's wrist. It's not far to their room, not far at all until Grenn shoves Pyp against the wall and kisses him fiercely. Pyp's been hot and itchy since Grenn showed up and he's still burning with the jealousy he doesn't want to admit to, and Grenn's hand feels so _good_between his legs.

"Three months," Grenn groans against his neck, sucking what will be bruise over his pulse point. Pyp doesn't care, doesn't know anyone who would confront them about it, doesn't know anyone who doesn't know by now.

His big, stupid lug is _home_.


End file.
